The present invention relates to a computer system management program for managing a computer system including a computer and a storage apparatus, a recording medium, a computer system, a management apparatus and a storage apparatus thereof, and in particular to a technique for setting a monitoring unit of a computer system by utilizing a hint used in operation of allocating a storage area in a storage apparatus and upon notifying a warning in the monitoring unit, creating an additional message of warning according to the hint and notifying it together with the warning.
Among monitoring systems monitoring a computer system, there is one utilizing a threshold value. The monitoring system acquires from respective apparatuses constituting a computer system, a numerical value (mainly, a performance value) indicating the state of the apparatuses and compares the value with a predetermined threshold value. If the former exceeds (is greater than or smaller than) the threshold value, a warning is generated.
When using this kind of monitoring system, there is a problem that it is difficult to select an appropriate threshold value. To cope with this, JP-A-2002-215230 discloses a method for easily setting an optimal threshold value. This method is as follows. Firstly, a user (administrator of the computer system) specifies the target number of threshold value violations of the numerical value indicating the state of the apparatuses to be managed for the monitoring system. Next, the monitoring system automatically adjusts the threshold value so that the number of threshold value violations of the numerical value indicating the state of the apparatuses to be managed is identical to the specified target threshold value violation number.
Nowadays, together with monitoring of the computer system, a large-scale storage apparatus such as a disk array apparatus, especially a storage region provided by a large-scale storage apparatus has become an important item to be managed. As a main component of the computer system, a storage area network is now widely used. This storage area network uses a fibre channel (FC) for connecting the computer to the storage apparatus in a network type format, thereby flexibly connecting a computer to a storage apparatus. Thus, for example, it is possible to perform data backup without using LAN (local area network), thereby enabling a new application.
Moreover, as a network connecting a computer to a storage apparatus, some techniques using IP (Internet Protocol) network attract attention and are widely spread. Under such a condition, an enterprise organization SNIA (Storage Networking Industry Association) has been organized by enterprises concerning storage network.
SNIA is promoting spread of the storage network through the activity of formulation of the standard specification of the storage network and peripheral technique. For example, SNIA suggests a standard specification for operation of allocating a storage area in a computer in the computer system including the storage apparatus. This specification is applied to management software managing a computer system. Moreover, this specification is based on CIM (Common Information Model) defined by DMTF (Distributed Management Task Force).
In the operation of this standard storage area allocation, a parameter indicating the storage area feature is defined. When allocating a storage area, an administrator creates this parameter for the user purpose of the storage area and inputs it to the management software, thereby creating a desired storage area. This parameter is called “hint”.
A portion associated with the hints is extracted below from the document defining the specification (Device 27_StorageServices. mof (lines 662 to 721) [online], Nov. 12, 2002, Distributed Management Task Force, [searched on Jan. 18, 2003], Internet
<URL:http://www.dmtf.org/standards/cim_schema_v27.php>.==================================================// StorageSettingWithHints//==================================================[Experimental, Version (“2.7.1”), Description (“This subclass of Storage Setting allows aclient to specify”“’hint’s for optimization of the volumeperformance. The effect”“of these hints is implementationdependent.”)]class CIM_StorageSettingWithHints: CIM_StorageSetting{[MinValue (0), MaxValue (10), Description (“This hint is an indication from a client ofthe importance”“placed on data availability. Values are 0 =Don't Care to”“10 = Very Important.”)]uint 16 DataAvailabilityHint;[MinValue (0), MaxValue (10), Description (“This hint is an indication from a client ofthe randomness”“of accesses. Values are 0 = EntirelySequential to”“10 = Entirely Random.”)]uint 16 AccessRandomnessHint;[MinValue (0), MaxValue (10), Description (“This hint is an indication from a client ofthe direction”“of accesses. Values are 0 = Entirely Readto”“10 = Entirely Write.”)]uint 16 AccessDirectionHint;[Description (“This hint is an indication from a client ofthe optimal”“access sizes. Several sizes can bespecified.”),Units (“MegaBytes”)]uint 16 AccessSizeHint #;[MinValue (0), MaxValue (10), Description (“This hint is an indication from a client howimportant”“access latency is. Values are 0 = Don'tCare to”“10 = Very important.”)]uint 16 AccessLatencyHint;[MinValue (0), MaxValue (10), Description (“This hint is an indication from a client ofbandwidth”“prioritization. Values are 0 = Don't Careto”“10 = Very important.”)]uint 16 AccessBandwidthWeight;[MinValue (0), MaxValue (10), Description (“This hint is an indication of the importancethe client”“places on the cost of storage. Values are 0= Don't Care to”“10 = Very important. A Storage Volumeprovider might choose”“to place data on low cost or high costdrives based on”“this parameter.”)]uint 16 StorageCostHint;[MinValue (0), MaxValue (10), Description (“This hint is an indication of the importanceplaced on”“storage efficiency by the client. Valuesare 0 = Don't Care”“to 10 = Very important. A Storage Volumeprovider might choose”“different RAID levels based on this hint.”)]uint 16 StorageEfficiencyHint;};
The management software mounting CIM should handle the hints in mounting operation of the storage volume allocation.